From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org ([208.92.234.80] helo=lists.gentoo.org) by finch.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1OHU9m-0005U5-4U for garchives@archives.gentoo.org; Thu, 27 May 2010 03:53:18 +0000 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 2004EE0833; Thu, 27 May 2010 03:52:21 +0000 (UTC) Received: from outbound.icp-qv1-irony-out1.iinet.net.au (outbound.icp-qv1-irony-out1.iinet.net.au [203.59.1.106]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B86E9E0833 for ; Thu, 27 May 2010 03:52:19 +0000 (UTC) X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Filtered: true X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Result: Ap0FAD6J/Ut8lOnP/2dsb2JhbACSGIwOccBDhRMEg0A X-IronPort-AV: E=Sophos;i="4.53,308,1272816000"; d="scan'208";a="683565020" Received: from unknown (HELO moriah.localdomain) ([124.148.233.207]) by outbound.icp-qv1-irony-out1.iinet.net.au with ESMTP; 27 May 2010 11:52:07 +0800 Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by moriah.localdomain (Postfix) with ESMTP id 985501CCB4CB for ; Thu, 27 May 2010 11:52:04 +0800 (WST) X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at localdomain Received: from moriah.localdomain ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (moriah.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id IUEB4rbShbIj for ; Thu, 27 May 2010 11:52:01 +0800 (WST) Received: from [192.168.43.7] (unknown [192.168.43.7]) by moriah.localdomain (Postfix) with ESMTP id 608A21CCB4C8 for ; Thu, 27 May 2010 11:52:01 +0800 (WST) Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Harddisk trouble ... or not yet? From: "W.Kenworthy" To: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org In-Reply-To: <20100527024359.GA5123@solfire> References: <20100526031510.GA5053@solfire> <201005261959.32671.volkerarmin@googlemail.com> <20100526200538.2d35834c@digimed.co.uk> <201005262113.06494.volkerarmin@googlemail.com> <20100526214055.2c814340@digimed.co.uk> <20100527001915.GA5748@solfire> <20100527024359.GA5123@solfire> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Organization: Home in Perth, Western Australia Date: Thu, 27 May 2010 11:52:00 +0800 Message-ID: <1274932320.16963.24.camel@bunyip.localdomain> Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Linux mail X-BeenThere: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Reply-to: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Evolution 2.28.3.1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Archives-Salt: 1071787b-47cc-4673-b82b-8b775e0eaf0c X-Archives-Hash: ddb9d09364c2348597ae5d44814e2f9a On Thu, 2010-05-27 at 04:43 +0200, meino.cramer@gmx.de wrote: > walt [10-05-27 04:08]: > > On 05/26/2010 05:19 PM, meino.cramer@gmx.de wrote: > > > > >Is there any way to check the disk without damaging its > > >contents? > > > > Do you know about SMART? Install sys-apps/smartmontools if you > > don't already have it, and read the manpage for smartctl. > > > > I add smartd to my default runlevel so the hard drives will test > > themselves once every month and log the test results in syslog. > > > > Hm. I just noticed that smartd isn't actually running, so I need > > to do some debugging now. But that's the idea, anyway. > > > > Hi, > yes, I know smart... > > I was more thinking of a tool, which test the whole disc surface > and reports every bad sector. > > Smarts is more of statistical kind: It counts events and tries > to calculate dooms day from that ;) > > Not so easy (coming in late on this thread, sorry if its been covered) Modern hard drives insulate the outside from whats actually happening internally. They have a number of spare locations they can swap into use when a bad patch develops. This is invisible except to something like smart reporting. Rule of thumb - when a modern drive starts showing bad sectors to the outside world, its already well past its use by date. So something like SMART is the only way for the average Joe to get the health of a drive. Google has lots on this sort of thing BillK